Stone Circle
by hakaru017
Summary: The goal of life is living in agreement with nature. Zeno, 335 BC 264 BC.
1. Chapter One: The Desert

Stone Circle

This story mainly takes place one hundred years after the events of the original adventure. Also, other stories that were talked about in the game are included, while giving a nostalgic view of the original adventure. Because Imagineer could not financially support the planned sequel to my favourite game, "Quest 64", or "Holy Magic Century" as it is in Australia, I wanted to expand on the story they seemed to have planned, the story of Leohn and Sophia. I am in Tokyo at the moment so I may not have much time until I return to Australia. I'll give it my best.

Chapter One: The Desert

Epona the Witch:

"The child is born…" I muttered. Lavaar's power had become so great that it had wiped out his mind. He was no longer in control of it. Even his body was crippling under the pressure, and it couldn't hold it in any more. Something escaped his mouth in an instant, in a form I couldn't comprehend. It moved at a speed I couldn't see. It tore up the Earth and became a storm. The whole kingdom of Dindom shattered, the fortress crumbling under the pressure and falling to the ground in massive shards of steel and rock. The houses were swept away in the wind.

Staring in awe at the fury before me, I heard a low moan uttered from Lavaar's mouth, dictated to him by the darkness clutching his soul. "I hate you… the pact that binds you…", he growled at me. The green grass swaying in the gentle wind and the blue sky had become covered in dark vapour. The Earth was shaking, and the air was choking. I watched as the darkness shafted into the sky, and ripped the wings from the birds, some trapped, beating their wings into rock, broken and bloody.

Lavaar's flesh appeared to simmer, his fingertips glued to the book. He wouldn't let go. He wanted the power so much. Staring at his face, I realised he had no humanity left in him at all. The shimmering heat of it made me tired, my vision distorted. I fell to the ground, and the vegetation beneath my fingers curled and simmered to black. I tried to get up, but the souls of my feet were cracked and burnt, and I slipped into the rocky interface of a deep shaft where the ground had cracked open, the flesh of the Earth peeling underneath the pressure of the birth.

The once soft zephyr was now a writhing storm, tearing down the walls of the kingdom. The birds fell from the sky, and to me it looked like the stars falling from the heavens. I pulled myself up onto the ground, rolling onto my back. Dindom itself had been turned upside down. It seemed as if the blood in my head was boiling and I was about to vomit. I moaned. "What vile form does this creature take?"

The sun was so strong, its beams filtering through the broken sky. All I could hear was the roaring wind, until I felt rough fingers wrap around my neck. I bolted upright, and stared into pale, bloodshot eyes. Lavaar was possessed by the rampant nightmare that escaped the book. His lips curled, uttering: "Tear apart the seed… dissolve the pact… banish art… invoke sleep…"

His other bloody hand grasped my neck. I felt my breath being choked out of me, and I desperately tried to pull his hands away from it. I pushed energy into my thighs and booted him in the stomach. Blood dribbled out of his mouth and splattered on my dress. My burning hands sifted through the dirt and found a sharp rock, and after thumping it into his cheekbone, he rolled off my cut body. I deeply inhaled air, but it felt like smoke in my lungs. I coughed and hacked tirelessly.

Lavaar's red tunic was torn and dirty, his grey hair knotted and broken. The picture of his crooked body was the consequence of his blind ambition. A man should have never turned those pages, and the text should not have been read. I couldn't help but wonder if the spirits had re-written the pages on this day, the language spelling a sick story of loss and hatred. Maybe the pact is broken. Do the spirits still have faith in humanity? Will mother go to sleep and let its fruits die? How could I kill him?

A sonic rush of fire suddenly escaped the cracks in the Earth. The child had left Lavaar, its steadily growing brain already tracking any sign of life and slaying it. The remaining trees burst into flames and disintegrated. Dindom plain had dried out; its water evaporated. Would all of Celtland suffer the same fate if the child's strength continued to grow? Without Lavaar, I was possibly the last hope for Celtland. I staggered across the ground, moving south towards Shamwood. The child was climbing in and out of the Earth like a drill, hacking away at the roots. I called, "child!"

The storm and flames in the distance rapidly turned and moved towards me like a pillar of fire. I tried to summon some energy inside me. I could feel it deep down. I relaxed, and let it rise inside me. My pulse fastened, the blood rushing faster around my body. I felt as if the spirits were confused by the imbalance in the sky, and were contemplating whether to share their energy. The flaming pillar, carrying the child, ripped across the plain, very close to me now. I managed to summon a magic barrier. "I'm too weak…"


	2. Chapter Two: Calm Inside The Storm

Chapter Two: Calm Inside The Storm

As I stood waiting for something I knew I couldn't hold back, my vision phased into a purple haze for a few seconds, and as it returned to normal I realised my barrier was gone. My defensive capabilities were far greater than attack, and so I realised I had no chance. I needed a miracle. The four elemental gems were attached to my belt, collected by my grandfather. It seemed like an awful thought to have to lose them, but as the entity tore down the cliffs surrounding the plain, I suddenly knew that I had no choice.

I didn't think twice. I picked off the gems from around the belt and flung them outwards into the air in a semi-circle. They halted in mid-air as the spirits took control of them. I knew it was their will that Mammon be destroyed, and this was the only hope. The ground was set alight in a circle of fire around me, the wind roared over the plain, a storm began, raining heavily, and the Earth began to shift again.

The Earth's power united, the elemental channels awakened. The full force of mother's elements were in effect, wiping the slate clean. I watched in awe as a shaft of light engulfed the flaming pillar and sucked up the child. The gems were shot into the sky with the shaft of light, like an arrow piercing the heavens, and dispersed to places beyond the horizon. The gems were gone. I had to sacrifice the stones. Had I also sacrificed my pact with nature? Whatever the consequence, the Eletale Book was shut, and I was still alive.

I picked up the unconscious and beaten Lavaar, walking back towards Greenoch from the ruins of Dindom. The reign of the Dindom kingdom was over, burnt down into dust. A desolate desert. Celtland would take a while to recover. I always believed, however, that Dindom still existed in a faraway place. Maybe beyond the stone gates my ancestors built.

However, in one of those places, Mammon waited. He hadn't died, but lost much of his power. He waited for a thousand years. It would take that long before the stone circles would be used again. Mammon's servants found the stones that locked him away, and sought to use them for their own power. The spirit of the Earth, invested in the four gems, was the only key to the other places, however I would not see them for another thousand years, until they were found by the servants of Mammon.

Years later, in the dark gaol:

The night was still, no life in the cave. It was always night there. Only one power inhabited this place. "Shannon, my marionette... Shannon, just like me. You are bound to me, and you are bound to this place. Why do the magicians hate me? I know why. I am a spirit born of their weakness."

Shannon looked up to her creator. His pupil expanded and compressed repeatedly in the centre of the red sea of blood, the mirror to his soul. She stood on a shard of rock, rubbish sucked into the darkness somehow. "Mammon, why am I here? What is my purpose in this cosmos?"

Mammon grinned. "This is why you are divine, Shannon. The childish nature of a human, their happiness and life, is an obstacle in front of the truth. They can't see beyond that obstacle. You, Shannon, you see. Your purpose is to observe. Observe the humans, and you can learn how vile they are. Your purpose is to be my… friend."

Shannon's lifeless stare searched around her for light. "Is everything, everywhere, dark, Mammon?"

Mammon let go of her hand and floated forwards a little. Little pieces of debris floated around him. He bent down and picked up a piece of stone in his hand. "When you are grown up, you will go to Celtland. You will find light there, and you will bring it to me. We'll take all the light from the humans that they took from us."

Epona speaks:

"It came to be that Shannon conceived Mammon's children, and that was to be her primary purpose. Mammon thought it a false hope for Shannon to lure someone to the gate and release him, but there was no other hope for him. In ways he expected death, but hoped his children could carry out the wishes he always wished he could have. It was centuries later that the children awoke from their sleep, and when they did, the story of the master apprentice and Mammon was already forgotten…"


	3. Chapter Three: Leohn

Chapter Three: Leohn

A young black-haired boy stands at the foot of a hill. He has climbed over the ruined stone walls, around the jagged broken steel fences, and through the overgrown foliage. Everything is very quiet; no one has been here for a long time. He can hear the waves rushing up against the cliffs nearby. He is carrying a black staff in his hand. As he looks up the bluff, feeling the warm sun relax his body, a nice feeling makes its way across his body and up to his head, and he shuts his eyes for a moment…

"What a beautiful place." He pauses before continuing on, making his way further up the hill, following what seems to be a spiraling path around the edge of the cliff. Walking up, he can see the green valleys of Kennishire in the distance. Finally at the top, he slowly walks to the edge of the bluff. Far below, there is blue sea until the horizon. A small boat drifts in the distance.

Turning around, he realizes that the top of the mountain is flat. Only ruined stone is scattered there, in a small pile near the center. He walks over to the pile, feeling the wind brush up against his face. Curious, he begins to shuffle through the shards of stone with his foot. Shhh… he hears sounds somewhere, but not around him, as if inside him.

An old lady's voice speaks to him: "Brian?..."

Stunned, the boy stands straight up. But he can't feel anything any more. Nevertheless, he says, "I'm Leohn…" Silence.

Frightened, he sifts through the shards furiously until an old tablet is revealed. He scans the tablet.

"As the people stand side by side in loving care,

The shadows have all been forgotten.

The demon Mammon lies in rest,

And his puppet long gone, across the seas.

Time has taken the people of the monastery,

And fate decides this time is over.

The spirits mould this changing land,

And blow the monastery down.

People forget the ways of nature,

And refuse to accept the gift.

As I spend my last days alone by the sea,

I bury my power where the walls once stood."

Abbott Brian

"GRRR.." Leohn spins around. A wolf is staring at him with blood red eyes. Shaking now, he backs away until he stands at the edge of the cliff. Not knowing what to do, he stays still, until the rock underneath him begins to collapse. He looses foothold as the stone crumbles beneath his leather boot. Instinctively grabbing a tree root in the dirt, he struggles to get back up on the cliff. "Grr…" the wolf growls, then pounces onto Leohn's fingers, digging the claws into his flesh. Leohn screams in pain, blood trickling down his arms. The wolf retreats for a moment, and his left arm looses grip on the tree root. Holding on with one weak, painful arm, he starts feeling tired. He looks down below him, to the jagged rocks in the sea.

He looks back at the wolf, turns slowly as if about to attack again. He realizes how dire the situation is, and feels so tired… hand growing so weak… and faints…


End file.
